Here are the HIGHLIGHTS from the Duleep Trophy 2022-23. This was Santadeep Dey and Abhishek Saini, bringing you all the action as it unfolds at the M. A. Chidambaram Stadium, Chennai and the CAP Ground 2, Puducherry. Our correspondents S. Dipak Ragav and S. Dinakar were reporting from ground zero.
UPDATES AND COMMENTARY
West Zone have dominated the play today. The openers Jaiswal and Shaw have scored fifties and have stitched up a 100-run stand.
It’s Stumps for the day at Puduchery. Manoj Tiwary and Virat Singh are on the crease for East Zone.
Gharami stand at the crease comes to an end on 68. Rana is able to produce the breakthrough for North Zone.
The second West Zone opener Yashasvi Jaiswal brings up his fifty as well. The southpaw reached the figure in 80 balls and has hit eight fours and one six in the innings. Shaw is playing at the other end on 59.
Prithvi Shaw reaches fifty with a six.
Jaiswal and Shaw continue to build their opening partnership. Both batsmen are inching towards a fifty. Shaw has hit two sixes while Shaw has hit one maximum.
North Zone has managed to arrest East Zone’s run rate but have failed to pick wickets. Gharami continues to lead the innings along with help from Virat Singh.
Mumbai batters Prithvi Shaw and Yashasvi Jaiswal have given a great start to West Zone. Shaw is batting on 24 runs while Jaiswal is unbeaten on 27 runs at the Tea break.
Sudip Gharami brings up his 50. The opening batsman has faced 88 deliveries and hit nine boundries.
Siddharth Kaul breaks the partnership and Anustup falls just shy of his half century.
West Zone vs North East Zone - Playing XI
West Zone - Ajinkya Rahane (c), Prithvi Shaw, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Het (wk), Hardik Jitendra Tamore, R A Tripathi, S Z Mulani, Chirag Jani, J Unadkat, C T Gaja, A Sheth.
North East Zone - Zhimomi (c), R Jonathan, Ashish Thapa (wk), Bishworjit, Dippu, Doria, Kishan Lyndoh, Al Bashid, Kishan Singha, Ankur, Rex
East Zone has got off to a solid start. Majumdar and Anustup have ensured their side recovered from the early wicket. Among North Zone’s bowlers, only Jagjit Sandhu has an economy rate below 4 runs per over.
- Meanwhile, the covers are off from Chepauk. The NorthEast Zone vs West Zone match will start at 2:40PM.
- North East Zone has won the toss and elected to field. Line ups out shortly.
Anustup Majumdar has shown some aggression and has scored 22 runs off 21 deliveries. On the other end, Gharami has held the fort. The opener has scored 10 runs off 29 balls.
Saini strikes! Riyan has been caught behind. Anustup, the new man in, will be expected to provide able support to his Bengal teammate at the other end.
Gharami smacks two boundaries off back-to-back deliveries over long-on and mid-wicket to get things rolling for East Zone. Riyan is yet to face a delivery.
- Gharami and Riyan to open for East Zone. Kaul has the new ball in hand. Let’s play!
PLAYING XI
East Zone: Sudip Kumar Gharami, Riyan Parag, Anustup Majumdar, Virat Singh, Manoj Tiwary (c), Abishek Porel (wk), Shahbaz Ahmed, M B Mura Singh, Shahbaz Nadeem, Akash Deep, Ishan Porel
North Zone: Yash Dhull, Dhruv Shorey, Manan Vohra, Mandeep Singh (c), H J Rana, Anmol Malhotra (wk), Pulkit Narang, Navdeep Saini, Siddharth Kaul, Jagjit Singh Sandhu, Nishant Sindhu
- Meanwhile, it is still a case of wait and watch at Chepauk. The covers are still on. We have lost one session already. Session 2 is going to be delayed as well.
- Finally! North Zone vs East Zone to start at 12:40pm. North Zone has won the toss and opted to bowl.
- Dipak updates at 11:12am: “Still raining here in Chepauk. It has gotten a bit heavy.” That should be it.
- The next inspection at Puducherry will be at 11:30AM.
- Dipak at 10:24am: “More steady drizzle here. Looks like the first session of the new season is set to be washed out.”
- Some good news coming in from Chepauk: “Rains have eased. But the light situation is still not great though it is slightly brighter than it was half-hour ago,” writes Dipak.
- The next inspection is at 10:30AM in Puducherry where North Zone is set to go up against East Zone.
TOSS
The flip of the coin has been delayed at both venues. In Chepauk, it is because of bad light. At CAP, it is due to overnight rain.
- Is weather a concern ahead of today’s game? A ride to office on the suburban train in Chennai provides a clear view of the pitch at Chepauk and as of 7:56am, it was drizzling. Not the steady one though; a drop here and a drop there. The pitch area was completely covered, the tarp totally wet. There were no players or officials in sight, with two shamianas set up in front of the international press box for the players.
The Duleep Trophy has been reintroduced after a three-season gap. The tournament was last held in the 2019-20 season in Bengaluru. Six teams – NorthEast Zone, North Zone, West Zone, East Zone, South Zone, and Central Zone – will take part in the competition that kickstarts India’s new domestic season.
Here is all you need to know -
MATCH PREVIEW
S. Dinakar from Puducherry writes: It rained rather heavily here on Wednesday evening. And more rain has been forecast on all four days of this encounter in the revived Duleep Trophy.
Both North and East Zones will be watching the weather with keen interest ahead of their quarterfinal beginning here on Thursday; it will influence their strategy and the selection of the eleven.
Rain or shine, Duleep Trophy will be returning in its original inter-zonal format. Then matches will have a context and a purpose.
Duleep Trophy, once the pride of the Indian domestic calendar, was thoughtlessly made into a caricature with teams being called Red, Blue, Green and so on - and randomly picked from different parts of the country which resulted in sides having minimum cohesion.
And they were made to play day/night matches with pink balls.
The present version, although welcome, will be no patch on the Duleep Trophy matches of the 70s and 80s when these games almost had the aura of a Test match.
North Zone, led by the irrepressible Bishen Bedi, and possessing the Amarnath brothers, Rajinder Goel and Kapil Dev will be up against Sunil Gavaskar-led West Zone with men such as Dilip Vengsarkar, Sandip Patil, Padmakar Shivalkar and Pandurang Salgoankar.
The matches would be bitterly fought and sparks would fly.
And the star-studded South Zone will feature Gundappa Viswanath, Tiger Pataudi, Erapalli Prasanna, B.S. Chandrasekar, S. Venkatraghavan, Syed Kirmani, Brijesh Patel, Roger Binny and K. Srikkanth.
But with a cramped international calendar, it is impossible to lift the Duleep Trophy to those glory days again.
Nevertheless, it will be a good opportunity for youngsters such as North’s Yash Dhull to showcase his talent and paceman Navdeep Saini to reestablish his claims.
Despite his successful foray into politics, it is good to see Manoj Tiwary, leading East, retaining his passion for the game. Left-arm spinner Shahbaz Nadeem is a capable bowler and Shahbaz Ahmed is an all-rounder with promise.
SQUADS
Here is W.V. Raman’s latest episode on where he talks about India’s domestic cricket season:
Ajinkya Rahane, captain of West Zone, seen practising ahead of the Duleep Trophy quarterfinal against NorthEast Zone at the MAC Stadium in Chennai. | Photo Credit: PICHUMANI K
WHERE TO WATCH DULEEP TROPHY 2022-23 LIVE?
The Duleep Trophy isn’t available for live telecast or live streaming. Only the final will be broadcast by the Star Sports Network.
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